Quick Links

Club PA 2.0 has arrived! If you'd like to access some extra PA content and help support the forums, check it out at patreon.com/ClubPA

The image size limit has been raised to 1mb! Anything larger than that should be linked to. This is a HARD limit, please do not abuse it.

Our new Indie Games subforum is now open for business in G&T. Go and check it out, you might land a code for a free game. If you're developing an indie game and want to post about it, follow these directions. If you don't, he'll break your legs! Hahaha! Seriously though.

Our rules have been updated and given their own forum. Go and look at them! They are nice, and there may be new ones that you didn't know about! Hooray for rules! Hooray for The System! Hooray for Conforming!

Yeah those Blizzard bastards still support Diablo 2, Warcraft 3 and the original Starcraft with patches, what a bunch of money motivated SOBs.

Puh-lease. Whatever Blizzard want to charge they are good for the money, they support their games over a decade after they come out and they never charged a cent for Battlenet. You get what you pay for with them and I don't think it's unreasonable for a game of Starcraft's quality to be released in 3 instalments especially with the amount of content they are cramming into each one. Fans are going to be playing Starcraft 2 for YEARS getting more than their money's worth so what's the problem? Boo hoo it's going to cost maybe a bit more than what SC and Brood War cost, get over it.

As an aside, what's with all the blizzard hate lately? IE All of their 'money grubbings and rawr we eat puppies'. They made an MMO 5 years ago, supported the shit out of it in terms of content for free, and now there are two expansions, both well received critically.

So evil?

The company's behavior is out of the norm from what people expect. And that behavior is that of a company that wants to make money, which is what all companies want to do in the long run. It's like when musicians 'sellout.' It's a job man, people do it to make a living. Shock and horror, the reality of the world. It has spilled into our pure slice of the gaming industry.

The behavior isn't "evil," it's just different.

It's not just different, it's sad, because Blizzard was always really awesome about things like LAN multiplayer, custom content, and spawned multiplayer installs. Hell, SC supported direct connect via serial. Which I sadly used more than once.

It's kind of like Microsoft. In the beginning, it was all about getting your product out as far and wide as you could. Install spawned multiplayer/demos on your friend's computers! Play together via internet/lan/direct dial/carrier pigeon! Then, they got huge, made $Texas on WoW, and everything's about locking down piracy, scanning running apps in memory, authentication, etc.

Ok, no lan to ensure people don't pirate Starcraft 2. Alright, it makes sense. What incentive do they have planned to keep people from pirating the 2 expansions? Unless they add new units to multiplayer, I think a lot of people will just buy the first game and not buy the 2 expansions.

Players have two options.
1. Buy the game. Patches and support, and you can play on B-net.
2. Pirate the game. Have to wait for patches to leak, and no B-net. But you can bet someone will have LAN capability cracked within a week of release.

I imagine a lot of people will end up doing both.

How do you suppose pirates will manage to "crack" a feature out of thin air?

Players have two options.
1. Buy the game. Patches and support, and you can play on B-net.
2. Pirate the game. Have to wait for patches to leak, and no B-net. But you can bet someone will have LAN capability cracked within a week of release.

I imagine a lot of people will end up doing both.

How do you suppose pirates will manage to "crack" a feature out of thin air?

Okay, I feel I am entering into dangerous waters here, but what is up with this "game in three parts" thing I keep hearing?

The first release of the game will be just a terran campaign. The zerg and protoss campaigns are coming as separate full price games.

Wha-?

Starcraft 2: Terran Campaign
- Single player is all about the Terrans (you playing as)
- Multiplayer has all the races available

Starcraft 2: Zerg Campaign
- Single player is all about playing as the Zerg
- Multiplayer has all the races available, maybe some new expansion-like shit too

Starcraft 2: Protoss Campaign
- Single player is all about playing as the Protoss
- Multiplayer has all the races available, maybe some new expansion-like shit too (units and such)

All told, if the single player content is as lengthy as they boast, I don't see what the problem is. I mean, I get the position people are taking somewhat, but when the misconception is being made that we're getting shit for content, it makes me a little bothered. We haven't seen the content, we only know what they're boasting, and when it comes to boasting Blizzard is one of the companies that delivers on it for the most part.

I hope I don't come across as a fanboy to them, that time is long since behind me. It's bullshit, but not as big as bullshit people make it out to be.

The LAN support thing though is just bullshit.

Henroid on June 2009

Centrism is just the cowardly way to be a bigot w/o being explicit about it.
American politics isn't 4D chess, it's just if you give a shit about other people or not.

It would be really dumb releasing SC2 without some form of LAN considering it's supposed to replace an entire industry built around it's predecessor in South Korea and spark new development in the west.

Doesn't South Korea have a super modern network infrastructure, with like 97% of the country online and on much faster connections than what we generally get in the US?

Players have two options.
1. Buy the game. Patches and support, and you can play on B-net.
2. Pirate the game. Have to wait for patches to leak, and no B-net. But you can bet someone will have LAN capability cracked within a week of release.

I imagine a lot of people will end up doing both.

How do you suppose pirates will manage to "crack" a feature out of thin air?

How about I just alter my DNS to resolve "battle.net" to whatever bnetd-like app I've written to facilitate multiplayer without Blizzard interceding?

Anything made my a human can be broken by another human. Someone will crack it, one way or another.

It would be really dumb releasing SC2 without some form of LAN considering it's supposed to replace an entire industry built around it's predecessor in South Korea and spark new development in the west.

Doesn't South Korea have a super modern network infrastructure, with like 97% of the country online and on much faster connections than what we generally get in the US?

Players have two options.
1. Buy the game. Patches and support, and you can play on B-net.
2. Pirate the game. Have to wait for patches to leak, and no B-net. But you can bet someone will have LAN capability cracked within a week of release.

I imagine a lot of people will end up doing both.

How do you suppose pirates will manage to "crack" a feature out of thin air?

The same way people mod games and crack the install files.

But to create a multi-player interface out of nothing is not exactly the same thing

It's like not MOD!, CRACK!, SHAZAM! and there's a LAN feature

How about I just alter my DNS to resolve "battle.net" to whatever bnetd-like app I've written to facilitate multiplayer without Blizzard interceding?

Anything made my a human can be broken by another human. Someone will crack it, one way or another.

As an aside, what's with all the blizzard hate lately? IE All of their 'money grubbings and rawr we eat puppies'. They made an MMO 5 years ago, supported the shit out of it in terms of content for free, and now there are two expansions, both well received critically.

So evil?

The company's behavior is out of the norm from what people expect. And that behavior is that of a company that wants to make money, which is what all companies want to do in the long run. It's like when musicians 'sellout.' It's a job man, people do it to make a living. Shock and horror, the reality of the world. It has spilled into our pure slice of the gaming industry.

The behavior isn't "evil," it's just different.

It's not just different, it's sad, because Blizzard was always really awesome about things like LAN multiplayer, custom content, and spawned multiplayer installs. Hell, SC supported direct connect via serial. Which I sadly used more than once.

It's kind of like Microsoft. In the beginning, it was all about getting your product out as far and wide as you could. Install spawned multiplayer/demos on your friend's computers! Play together via internet/lan/direct dial/carrier pigeon! Then, they got huge, made $Texas on WoW, and everything's about locking down piracy, scanning running apps in memory, authentication, etc.

You say this, and yet I can plug in a serial code for SC I, because my cd is cracked, into their DD service and get the game right to my pc, at no charge.

This is light years ahead of other companies, and in no way indicative of the sort of behavior you're trying to pin on them. Be reasonable.

Players have two options.
1. Buy the game. Patches and support, and you can play on B-net.
2. Pirate the game. Have to wait for patches to leak, and no B-net. But you can bet someone will have LAN capability cracked within a week of release.

I imagine a lot of people will end up doing both.

How do you suppose pirates will manage to "crack" a feature out of thin air?

How about I just alter my DNS to resolve "battle.net" to whatever bnetd-like app I've written to facilitate multiplayer without Blizzard interceding?

Anything made my a human can be broken by another human. Someone will crack it, one way or another.

Hey look at that. Bnet lives on 127.0.0.1

Darkchampion3d on June 2009

Our country is now taking so steady a course as to show by what road it will pass to destruction, to wit: by consolidation of power first, and then corruption, its necessary consequence --Thomas Jefferson

As an aside, what's with all the blizzard hate lately? IE All of their 'money grubbings and rawr we eat puppies'. They made an MMO 5 years ago, supported the shit out of it in terms of content for free, and now there are two expansions, both well received critically.

So evil?

The company's behavior is out of the norm from what people expect. And that behavior is that of a company that wants to make money, which is what all companies want to do in the long run. It's like when musicians 'sellout.' It's a job man, people do it to make a living. Shock and horror, the reality of the world. It has spilled into our pure slice of the gaming industry.

The behavior isn't "evil," it's just different.

It's not just different, it's sad, because Blizzard was always really awesome about things like LAN multiplayer, custom content, and spawned multiplayer installs. Hell, SC supported direct connect via serial. Which I sadly used more than once.

It's kind of like Microsoft. In the beginning, it was all about getting your product out as far and wide as you could. Install spawned multiplayer/demos on your friend's computers! Play together via internet/lan/direct dial/carrier pigeon! Then, they got huge, made $Texas on WoW, and everything's about locking down piracy, scanning running apps in memory, authentication, etc.

Salmon'd for wut? Dude, Starcraft came out in 1996 and it certainly wasn't the only game at that time to support serial connection. Lucasarts did it with Rebellion and Jedi Knight, and the first Alien vs. Predator did it too (I forget what year that came out, later though).

Henroid on June 2009

Centrism is just the cowardly way to be a bigot w/o being explicit about it.
American politics isn't 4D chess, it's just if you give a shit about other people or not.

Players have two options.
1. Buy the game. Patches and support, and you can play on B-net.
2. Pirate the game. Have to wait for patches to leak, and no B-net. But you can bet someone will have LAN capability cracked within a week of release.

I imagine a lot of people will end up doing both.

How do you suppose pirates will manage to "crack" a feature out of thin air?

How about I just alter my DNS to resolve "battle.net" to whatever bnetd-like app I've written to facilitate multiplayer without Blizzard interceding?

Anything made my a human can be broken by another human. Someone will crack it, one way or another.

Players have two options.
1. Buy the game. Patches and support, and you can play on B-net.
2. Pirate the game. Have to wait for patches to leak, and no B-net. But you can bet someone will have LAN capability cracked within a week of release.

I imagine a lot of people will end up doing both.

How do you suppose pirates will manage to "crack" a feature out of thin air?

The same way people mod games and crack the install files.

But to create a multi-player interface out of nothing is not exactly the same thing

It's like not MOD!, CRACK!, SHAZAM! and there's a LAN feature

Modders have given multiplayer to games with zero multiplayer support before.

Starcraft 2: Terran Campaign
- Single player is all about the Terrans (you playing as)- Multiplayer has all the races available

Most important thing, right there.

Indeed.

To elaborate on the single player stuff, imagine each race's story being like a pie. You can either be delivered the pies as a whole one at a time, or getting 1/3 of each pie on three occassions. In the end, you still get all three. Why this is a problem I don't fucking know. Maybe the tradition of expansion story delivery being broken is making people confused and angry.

Henroid on June 2009

Centrism is just the cowardly way to be a bigot w/o being explicit about it.
American politics isn't 4D chess, it's just if you give a shit about other people or not.

So you're saying just because someone can break it means Blizzard shouldn't try to defend their product from theft?

There are better ways to protect a product from theft than removing a feature from the product.

You forgot the part where they removed it because they're adding an as yet unannounced feature, which is probably the exact same feature, just over b.net 2.0

If my LAN game requires internet connectivity, it isn't really a LAN game as one of the benefits of that is you don't need the interwebs to play.

Darkchampion3d on June 2009

Our country is now taking so steady a course as to show by what road it will pass to destruction, to wit: by consolidation of power first, and then corruption, its necessary consequence --Thomas Jefferson

Players have two options.
1. Buy the game. Patches and support, and you can play on B-net.
2. Pirate the game. Have to wait for patches to leak, and no B-net. But you can bet someone will have LAN capability cracked within a week of release.

I imagine a lot of people will end up doing both.

How do you suppose pirates will manage to "crack" a feature out of thin air?

The same way people mod games and crack the install files.

But to create a multi-player interface out of nothing is not exactly the same thing

It's like not MOD!, CRACK!, SHAZAM! and there's a LAN feature

Modders have given multiplayer to games with zero multiplayer support before.

Sure, but will it be 1) Stable 2) Needed at all?

If my LAN game requires internet connectivity, it isn't really a LAN game as one of the benefits of that is you don't need the interwebs to play.

â€œis because of the planned technology to be incorporated into Battle.net.â€

I think we're jumping the gun on the 'omg no games without internet!!!' thing

I'm thinking an offline mode or something along those lines, similar to steam

If it has an offline mode like steam then there is no problem.

Darkchampion3d on June 2009

Our country is now taking so steady a course as to show by what road it will pass to destruction, to wit: by consolidation of power first, and then corruption, its necessary consequence --Thomas Jefferson

Players have two options.
1. Buy the game. Patches and support, and you can play on B-net.
2. Pirate the game. Have to wait for patches to leak, and no B-net. But you can bet someone will have LAN capability cracked within a week of release.

I imagine a lot of people will end up doing both.

How do you suppose pirates will manage to "crack" a feature out of thin air?

The same way people mod games and crack the install files.

But to create a multi-player interface out of nothing is not exactly the same thing

It's like not MOD!, CRACK!, SHAZAM! and there's a LAN feature

Modders have given multiplayer to games with zero multiplayer support before.

It's possible to reverse engineer source code from an executable. Once you have the source code you whatever you want with the game.

Players have two options.
1. Buy the game. Patches and support, and you can play on B-net.
2. Pirate the game. Have to wait for patches to leak, and no B-net. But you can bet someone will have LAN capability cracked within a week of release.

I imagine a lot of people will end up doing both.

How do you suppose pirates will manage to "crack" a feature out of thin air?

The same way people mod games.

Actually that's called modding, not cracking.

Also mods are created from custom models, sounds, maps and code that hooks into the game engine, just about always with the specific support from the original developer. If SC2 is hard-coded to interact with Battle.net to find games, IMO it would be basically impossible to get your code to run in-process, hook in to the game connection algorithms, integrate with the UI. This is all assuming you've got the LAN connection logic coded up yourself and you've managed to faithfully re-create the game hosting code to self-host.

So you're saying just because someone can break it means Blizzard shouldn't try to defend their product from theft?

Like I was saying about DoW II's anti lan hamachi features, you can always break something, but the key is to make it so annoyingly difficult that it crosses the convenience threshold for 99% of people who, if they are inclined to buy the game at all, would rather just shell out than bother with painful crack processes. And I support intelligent processes that make it harder to pirate stuff.

â€œis because of the planned technology to be incorporated into Battle.net.â€

I think we're jumping the gun on the 'omg no games without internet!!!' thing

I'm thinking an offline mode or something along those lines, similar to steam

Which is why I said I'm reserving full judgement until the details are available. They could easily just mean "olol friends list!" though. That phrase itself doesn't mean a whole lot. What we DO know, though, is that at this moment, you can't stick two computers on a LAN together and just play. Internet is required, either for authentication or actual game serving. This is a value negative to me.

Players have two options.
1. Buy the game. Patches and support, and you can play on B-net.
2. Pirate the game. Have to wait for patches to leak, and no B-net. But you can bet someone will have LAN capability cracked within a week of release.

I imagine a lot of people will end up doing both.

How do you suppose pirates will manage to "crack" a feature out of thin air?

The same way people mod games.

Actually that's called modding, not cracking.

Also mods are created from custom models, sounds, maps and code that hooks into the game engine, just about always with the specific support from the original developer. If SC2 is hard-coded to interact with Battle.net to find games, IMO it would be basically impossible to get your code to run in-process, hook in to the game connection algorithms, integrate with the UI. This is all assuming you've got the LAN connection logic coded up yourself and you've managed to faithfully re-create the game hosting code to self-host.

If you have to reverse engineer the source code in order to mod the game then it's both.